New Border Voices: An Anthology

Acknowledgments

Acknowledgments The editors of New Border Voices: An anthology first want to thank Mary Lenn Dixon and Texas A&M University Press for noticing the importance of this volume . Texas A&M University Press’s scholarly publishing reputation and its track recordofproducingbeautifulbooksforreadersmadethepressourfirstchoice.We are indebted to the press for its willingness to nurture our Border’s creative voices. The editors also offer our thanks to Jóse E. Limón of Notre Dame University for allowing us permission to reprint “A ‘Southern Renaissance’ for Texas Letters” and for graciously revisiting the essay in New Border Voices’ introduction . Limón’s critical Border literary works, and especially his edition of Jovita González’s Cabellero, did a lot to inspire this anthology. We also thank Pat Dubrava for translating Agustín Cadena’s “The Border Is a Good Place to Live” and other works that ultimately fell to the editorial cutting room floor. Pat is the consummate professional and provides quick and clean translation copy. We also thank Juan Ochoa for providing translation assistance on a number of stories that unfortunately did not make their way into New Border Voices. We also thank Octavio Quintanilla for translating the original New Border Voices call-for-submissions into Spanish and sending it on to our Spanishspeaking counterparts. I personally thank Joanne Bartlett and the late Dick Bartlett for hosting me as the Thinking Like a Mountain Foundation Writer’s Bloc writer-in-residence in Fort Davis, Texas, where I first read through some four hundred New Border Voices submissions. The view and solitude were superb. I also want to thank Texas Tech University’s Bruce Family Fellowship in American Literature for allowing me relief from teaching duties to focus on my coursework and the editing of New Border Voices. I offer my deepest thanks to my coeditors and compañeros Robert Johnson and Erika Garza-Johnson for their willingness to undertake this project with me. Their patience with my Type-A perfectionism is deeply appreciated. And, finally, we give the deepest heartfelt thanks to the most important cogs in the New Border Voices machinery: our contributors. Without the creative works submitted, whether accepted or declined for publication, this anthology would never have seen the light of day. We thank each of you for sharing your efforts and hearts with us. We are confident we produced a book you are proud to call yourself a part of. Con mucho gusto: New Border Voices is your voice and your legacy. —Brandon D. Shuler Texas Tech University New Border Voices ...